“Think of the Children!”

Abstract

This experiment examined children's visual aesthetics and learning motivation with regard to websites. It applied Berlyne's theory of aesthetic preference to these websites. The experiment explored the relations between visual complexity, visual aesthetics, learning motivation, and children's age, and their effect on websites. A total of 150 children between 10 and 12 years old were involved. The children were asked to rate websites of different levels of perceived visual complexity in terms of visual aesthetic and learning motivation. The results showed that the children preferred websites that displayed a medium level of perceived visual complexity to those that displayed a high or low level of perceived visual complexity. Thus, the results supported Berlyne's theory. However, when aesthetic preference was analyzed with respect to age-related differences, it was found that older children preferred a medium level of perceived visual complexity and younger children preferred a high level of perceived visual complexity.